To our shareholders:
致我们的股东:
In many ways, Amazon.com is not a normal store. Wehave deep selection that is unconstrained by shelf space. We turn our inventory 19 times in a year. We personalize the store for each and every customer. We trade real estate for technology (which gets cheaper and more capable everyyear). We display customer reviews critical of our products. You can make apurchase with a few seconds and one click. We put used products next to newones so you can choose. We share our prime real estate—our product detail pages—with third parties, and, if they can offer better value, we let them.
在许多方面，Amazon.com不是一个通常意义上的商店。我们有不受货架空间限制的深度选择。我们的存货一年周转19次。我们为每一位顾客打造个性化商店。我们不用房地产而用技术（技术每年都变得更便宜、更有能力）。我们展示客户对我们产品的评论。你只需几秒钟点击一下就可以购买。我们把二手商品放在新产品旁边，这样你就可以选择。我们与第三方分享我们的主要物业空间——我们的产品详细信息页面，如果他们能提供更好的价值，我们就让他们提供。
One of our most exciting peculiarities is poorly understood. People see that we're determined to offer both world-leading customer experience and the lowest possible prices, but to some this dual goal seems paradoxical if not downright quixotic.
我们最令人兴奋的一个特性其实知道的人很少。人们看到，我们决心提供世界领先的客户体验和尽可能低的价格，但对一些人来说，这种双重目标似乎自相矛盾，如果不是彻头彻尾的不切实际的。
Traditional stores face a time-tested tradeoff between offering high-touch customer experience on the one hand and the lowest possible prices on the other. How can Amazon.com be trying to do both?
传统商店面临着一个久经考验的权衡，一方面提供高顾客体验，另一方面尽可能降低价格。Amazon.com怎么能两者兼顾呢？
The answer is that we transform much of customer experience—such as unmatched selection, extensive product information, personalized recommendations, and other new software features—into largely a fixed expense. With customer experience costs largely fixed (more like a publishing model than a retailing model), our costs as a percentage of sales can shrink rapidly as we grow our business. Moreover, customer experience costs that remain variable—such as the variable portion of fulfillment costs—improve in our model as we reduce defects. Eliminating defects improves costs and leads to better customer experience.
答案是，我们将许多客户体验成本——如无与伦比的选择、广泛的产品信息、个性化的推荐和其他新的软件功能——转化为很大程度上的固定成本。随着客户体验成本在很大程度上固定下来（更像是一种出版模式，而不是零售模式），随着我们业务的增长，我们的成本在销售额中所占的比例会迅速下降。此外，随着我们减少缺陷，我们模型中那些可变的客户体验成本（如履行成本的可变部分）也会有所改善。消除缺陷降低了成本，并带来更好的客户体验。
We believe our ability to lower prices and simultaneously drive customer experience is a big deal, and this past year offers evidence that the strategy is working.
我们相信，我们能够降低价格，同时提升客户体验，这是一件非常重要的事，过去的一年证明了这一战略是有效的。
First, we do continue to drive customer experience. The holiday season this year is one example. While delivering arecord number of units to customers, we also delivered our best-ever experience. Cycle time, the amount of time taken by our fulfillment centers to process anorder, improved 17% compared with last year. And our most sensitive measure ofcustomer satisfaction, contacts per order, saw a 13% improvement.
首先，我们会继续提升客户体验。今年的假期就是一个例子。在为客户提供创纪录数量的产品的同时，我们也提供了有史以来最好的体验。订单周期，即我们的履行中心处理订单所花费的时间，与去年改善了17%。我们对客户满意度最敏感的衡量指标，即平均每份订单的联系客服的次数，改进了13%。
Inside existing product categories, we've worked hard to increase selection.
在现有的产品类别中，我们努力增加客户的选择。
Electronics selection is up over 40% in the U. S. alone over the prior year, and we nowoffer 10 times the selection of a typical big box electronics store. Even in U.S. books, where we've been working for 8 years, we increased selection by 15%, mostly in harder-to-find and out-of-printtitles. And, of course, we've added new categories. Our Apparel and Accessories store has more than 500 top clothing brands, and in its first 60 days, customers bought 153,000 shirts, 106,000 pairs of pants, and 31,000 pairs of underwear.
仅在美国，电子产品的选择就比前一年增加了40%以上，我们现在提供的选择是典型的大型电子产品商店的10倍。即使在我们已经销售了8年的美国书籍中，我们也增加了15%的选择，主要是难以找到的和绝版的书籍。当然，我们增加了新的类别。我们的服装服饰店有500多个顶级服装品牌，在开业的头60天里，顾客购买了153,000件衬衫、106,000条裤子和31,000条内衣。
In this year's American Customer Satisfaction Index, the most authoritative study of customer satisfaction, Amazon.com scored an 88, the highest score ever recorded—not just online, not just in retailing—but the highest score ever recorded in any service industry. InACSI's words:
在今年最权威的顾客满意度研究——美国顾客满意度指数中，Amazon.com获得了88分，这是有史以来的最高分——不仅是在线，也不仅仅是零售——而且是任何服务行业有史以来的最高分。用ACSI的话说:
"Amazon.com continues to show remarkably high levels of customer satisfaction.
“亚马逊继续显示出极高的客户满意度。
With a score of 88 (up 5%), it is generating satisfaction at a level unheard of in the service industry…. Can customer satisfaction for Amazon climb more? The latest ACSI data suggest that it isindeed possible. Both service and the value proposition offered by Amazon have increased at a steep rate. "
得分为88分（上升5%），这是服务业前所未有的满意度。顾客对亚马逊的满意度能更高吗？ACSI最新数据表明这确实是可能的。亚马逊提供的服务和价值主张都大幅增长。"
Second, while focused on customer experience, we've also been lowering price substantially. We've been doing so broadly across product categories, from books to electronics, and we've eliminated shipping fees with our 365 day-per-year Free Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. We've been taking similar actions in every country in which we do business.
其次，在关注客户体验的同时，我们也在大幅降低价格。从书籍到电子产品，我们的产品种类非常广泛，而且通过365天的免费超级节省邮递计划我们取消25美元以上订单的运费。我们在开展业务的每个国家都采取了类似的行动。
Our pricing objective is not to discount a small number of products for a limited period of time, but to offer low prices everyday and apply them broadly across our entire product range. To illustrate this point, we recently did a price comparison versus a major well-known chainof book superstores. We did not hand pick a choice group of books against which we wanted to compare. Instead, we used their published list of their 100 best sellers for 2002. It was a good representation of the kinds of books people buy most, consisting of 45 hardcover titles and 55 paperbacks across many different categories, including Literature, Romance, Mystery and Thrillers, Nonfiction,Children's, Self-Help, and so on.
我们的定价目标不是在有限的时间内给少数产品打折，而是每天提供低价，并在我们的整个产品系列中广泛应用。为了说明这一点，我们最近做了一个价格比较，与一个主要的知名连锁书店进行比较。我们没有主观地挑选一组我们想与之比较的书。相反，我们使用了他们公布的100本2002年的畅销书。它很好地代表了人们购买最多的书籍种类，包括45本精装书和55本平装书，涵盖了许多不同的类别，包括文学、爱情、推理和惊悚、非虚构、儿童、工具书等等。
We priced all 100 titles by visiting their superstores in both Seattle and New York City. It took us six hours in four oftheir different superstores to find all 100 books on their list. When we added up everything we spent, we discovered that:
我们在他们在西雅图和纽约的超市来找到了所有100本书的定价。我们花了六个小时在他们四个不同的超市里找到了他们单子上所有的100本书。当我们把我们花的所有钱加起来时，我们发现:
• At their stores, these 100 best selling bookscost $1,561. At Amazon.com , the same books cost $1,195 for a total savings of$366, or 23%.
在他们的店里，这100本畅销书的价格是1561美元。在Amazon.com，同样的书售价为1195美元，总共节省了366美元，即23%。
• For 72 of the 100 books, our price was cheaper. On 25 of the books, our price was the same. On 3 of the 100, their prices were better (we subsequently reduced our prices on these three books).
100本书中有72本，我们的价格更便宜。有25本书，我们的价格是一样的。100本书中有3本的他们的价格更好（我们随后立即降低了这三本书的价格）。
• In these physical-world superstores, only 15 oftheir 100 titles were discounted—they were selling the other 85 at full list price. At Amazon.com , 76 of the 100 were discounted and 24 were sold at list price.
在这些物理世界的超级商场中，100种商品中只有15种打折他们正以全价出售另外85种。在Amazon.com，76本在打折，24本以标价出售。
To be sure, you may find reasons to shop in the physical world—for instance, if you need something immediately—but, if you do so, you'll be paying a premium. If you want to save money and time, you'll do better by shopping at Amazon.com .
可以肯定的是，你可能会找到在现实世界购物的理由——例如，如果你马上就需要得到某样东西——但是，如果你这样做了，你将会支付额外的费用。如果你想省钱省时，去Amazon.com购物会更好。
Third, our determination to deliver low price and customer experience is generating financial results. Net sales this year increased 26% to a record $3. 9 billion, and unit sales grew at an even faster 34%. Free cash flow—our most important financial measure—reached $135 million, a $305 million improvement over the prior year[1].
第三，我们提供低价和客户体验的决策正在产生财务结果。今年的净销售额增长了26%，达到创纪录的39亿美元，销售量增长速度更快，达到34%。自由现金流——我们最重要的财务指标——达到1.35亿美元，比前一年增加了3.05亿美元。
In short, what's good for customers is good for shareholders.
简而言之，对客户有好处的东西对股东也有好处。
Once again this year, I attach a copy of our original 1997 letter and encourage current and prospective shareowners to take a look at it. Given how much we've grown and how much the Internet has evolved, it's notable that the fundamentals of how we do business remain the same.
今年，我再次附上我们1997年的原始信件的副本，并鼓励目前和未来的股东看一看。考虑到我们的成长和互联网的发展，我们想强调的是我们做生意的基本原则保持不变。
As always, we at Amazon.com are grateful to our customers for their business and trust, to each other for our hard work, and toour shareholders for their support and encouragement.
一如既往，Amazon.com感谢客户和我们做生意并信任我们，感谢彼此的辛勤工作，感谢股东的支持和鼓励。
JeffreyP. Bezos
Founderand Chief Executive Officer
Amazon.com, Inc.
[1]Free cash flow for 2002 of $135 million is netcash provided by operating activities of $174 million less purchases of fixedassets of $39 million. Free cash flow for 2001 of negative $170 million is netcash used in operating activities of $120 million less purchases of fixedassets of $50 million.
2002年1.35亿美元的自由现金流量是经营活动产生的现金净额1.74亿美元减去购买的固定资产3900万美元。2001年的自由现金流量为负1.7亿美元，是经营活动中产生的现金净额负1.2亿美元减去购买的固定资产5000万美元。